A Nation of Mystics/ Book One: Intentions

By Pamela Johnson

In A Nation of Mystics, author Pamela Johnson deftly explores the youth subculture in San Francisco and Berkeley in the mid-1960s, with all its initial goodwill and naiveté--its dedication to free speech, promise to end war, commitment to racial equality, new art and music, and the exploration of spirituality based on mind-expanding hallucinogens.

In this epic story of intimacy, metaphysical exploration, and coming of age, the Haight-Ashbury becomes home to genuine and unforgettable characters: Christian Brooks, haunted by a fiery riot in India, leaves the ministry for a new path to God. Kathleen Murray arrives seeking to change the world and exchanges picket lines for a more direct method of altering consciousness. Brilliant young botany student Myles Corbet must choose between prison and betraying his oldest friend. Jerry Putnam, seeking knowledge through science, instead discovers the shamanic calling. Opposing them is drug agent Dolph Bremer, who vows to crush the counterculture movement through any means necessary, while attorney Lance Bormann carefully walks between worlds to defend his young clients.

Book One, Intentions, is the story of the communal family's growing commitment to the creation of a new culture--to social action, expanded awareness, new insights into the nature of mind, and the courage to make change.

Although set in the 1960s, A Nation of Mystics is strikingly relevant, addressing conflicts between political idealism and the old order, violent police overreach, and the beginning of America's War on Drugs.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Pamela Johnson
• Release date: Sep 23, 2016
• ISBN: 9780998117133

Pamela Johnson

Pamela Johnson, a former Senior Editor of Essence magazine and now a frequent contributor, is a graduate of Stanford University.

Book preview

CHRISTIAN BROOKS

UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, BERKELEY

OCTOBER 1965

With his scream still receding into the shadows of the room, Christian Brooks struggled to awaken among a tangle of sheets. Still gripped by nightmare images of burning buildings and the grasp of dark hands, he blinked and looked around the room. No longer were there angry shouts, the sound of explosions, the roar of fire. The only sound was the harsh rasp of his breathing.

Safe, he slowly realized, I’m no longer in danger, but safe here in the Berkeley apartment.

Rising in the dim light of dawn, he stumbled through hazy shadow and leaned his forehead against the cool glass of the windowpane. The pale, pink, October sky was growing brighter, colors changing by the second. Still breathing heavily, Christian ran his hands across his face and eyes and looked to the street below, to movement, color, someone walking in early morning—anything to distract his fast-beating heart. Behind him, the bedroom door opened slowly.

Hey, man, Matt’s sleepy voice mumbled. Everything okay?

Just … just a bad dream, he murmured, embarrassed he was unable to control the trembling in his voice.

You want to talk about it? It’s not the first time.

He stood naked at the window, his back turned to Matt, but Christian still saw the dream in bits and pieces, a night of riot in the Punjabi city of Amritsar, narrow streets filled with madness and terror. In the confusion of the dream, he was forever running after Nareesh … so close, Nareesh was so close … but no matter how fast he ran, Christian was never able to reach him, was only able to chase his friend’s vanishing form, muted on one side by shadow and illuminated on the other by the glare of fire.

Instinctively, he rubbed the thin, raised scar near his left temple, a small but terrible reminder of what had happened in India only months ago. In this moment of absolute truth, in this place where he could not hide from himself, he finally asked the question he had tried to avoid: Was it all my fault?

What if he had stuck to the plan that had been expected of him all his life—gone to divinity school and returned to take over his father’s mission?

In both despair and frustration, he raised his clenched fist and pounded the wood of the windowsill once, twice, three times. The reality was that he had chosen differently, and the dead could not be brought back.

Christian? Matt asked again. Anything I can do? We’ve got classes in a few hours, and I’ve got to start getting ready for work soon. But we could have some coffee. Maybe talk for a while?

Christian knew Matt meant well, but how could he speak of the recurring nightmare, or the importance of Nareesh in his life, that he and Nareesh had shared almost every thought from the time he was five years old? How could he explain to this unworldly, nineteen-year-old student from San Diego the poverty of India, the complicated politics of a world where religion still mattered a great deal? Matt had grown up with the Beach Boys, a surfboard, and high school dances. He had no religion, or if he did, he never spoke of it. Did he really care that in another part of the world, praying five times a day was unbroken law, that a cow was considered sacred, revered? Could Matt understand that an invasion of Tibet had created untold misery, moving a culture abruptly from a medieval existence into an unknown world, or the Tibetan belief that the knowledge of centuries had to be preserved in the lamas making their secret way over the Himalayas?

Thank you, Christian answered quietly. But … there’s nothing to be done.

No. He could not begin to explain the dream to Matt. To do so would mean he’d have to explain things about himself he wasn’t ready to share, things even he did not understand. To speak of the riot and all its consequences would be to relive it again, to make it real. The relationship with his father, the Reverend Charles Brooks, was complicated, more than his simply quitting school at a theological seminary and going off on his own. His anger toward the man who had given him life and care bewildered him, but it was still there.

On the morning after the riot, still recovering from wounds of body and spirit, and against his fierce objections, Christian had been packed off by his father to an aunt in Oberlin, Ohio. Seventeen at the time, the trip had been long, by small plane from Amritsar, in northwestern India, to New Delhi; by jet to Bangkok, then Tokyo, Honolulu, Los Angeles, and finally to Oberlin. He had flown alone, silent, and in the darkness, facing the plane’s small window, had stifled his sobs while the man next to him slept.

By the time he’d disembarked in Oberlin, his eyes were dry. All that remained was the anxious longing to see Nareesh, to be able to talk through the entire complicated mess that had put them both in the center of a ferocious religious upheaval. But Nareesh was not due until divinity school began in August. So, holding on to his anxiety, he waited. His aunt had tried to help, to speak to the desolate sadness in his eyes, his stunned bewilderment. But he needed Nareesh and all the shared history between them.

July came, and with it, his eighteenth birthday.

August. With a great deal of anticipation, he’d packed his few belongings and settled into the dorm, waiting for Nareesh to walk through the door and take up residence as his roommate. Classes began, but Nareesh never appeared. Not a word to the school or to Christian. As the first days of the semester passed, Christian was filled with a growing sickness. Had something happened to Nareesh on the night of the riot? Had his father kept something from him?

Then the dream began.

By mid-October, the questions and longing had receded, hidden in the nightmare. In the day to day of his new life, he’d joined a group that planned to work in the South the following summer, registering Negro voters. A girl had briefly held his interest, but an all-boys boarding school in India had made him different, somewhat shy. He began to follow the news about happenings in Berkeley, California: a political movement to ensure free speech on campus.

When December finally arrived and with it, the end of the first semester, he had known he wasn’t ready to make a commitment to the ministry. He had resigned from the divinity school, knowing that doing so would break his father’s heart. At the time, the thought had crossed his mind that hurting his father was perhaps half his motivation.

At the beginning of the year, with the news stories about the Free Speech Movement still fresh, he had set off for California without money, a place to stay, or acquaintances. Once there, he’d been granted one of the few remaining places for winter quarter and had enrolled full time at the university. On that day when he’d sat outside the Admissions Building with acceptance papers in hand, suitcase with all he owned at his feet, and wondering where he would go, Matt had casually approached.

What had drawn Matt to that bench, Christian had always considered karma. But there Matt was, carefree, teasing Christian about his forlorn face. And when Christian had explained his situation, how he’d left the Ohio college without his father’s permission, Matt had playfully punched his arm and waved his hand in casual dismissal of parents everywhere. Then, understanding Christian’s empty pockets and what the suitcase represented, Matt had given him a place to stay and helped him to find a job.

Over the summer, they had rented a two-bedroom apartment on the top floor of an old three-story building on the south side of the Berkeley campus, near Telegraph Avenue. Housing was tough to come by, and it was a small miracle that a graduate student had sublet the apartment for a year. An ordinary student lodging, some would have called it—a small kitchen, where not much was cooked, the countertops scratched by countless knives; a living room with a worn green couch and a matching chair; a laminate table, and four chairs with upholstery escaping from the sharp corners of their plastic seat covers. Each bedroom provided a single bed, a brown-stained dresser, and a small desk. The only considered piece of art was a poster tacked to the wall above the dining room table, of Mario Savio carefully removing his shoes before standing on the roof of a police car to speak to the crowds. From his bedroom window, Christian could just see a corner of Sproul Plaza, the center of the Free Speech Movement protests of last year and, beyond it, the Sather Gate entrance to the university.

October classes had already started, and he’d moved forward—courses in basic requirements, math and English, but also in the subjects he loved: history and political science.

The only thing that was left of a past Christian was trying to forget was the dream that pursued him.

Time was already moving into late afternoon when Christian returned to the apartment after work, walked into the bedroom, and threw his leather book bag onto his bed. He looked toward the desk, with its new stack of books, but instead of opening the history syllabus and digging in as he should have, he took a seat on the floor, straightened his back in lotus, closed his eyes, and began a familiar meditation, searching for the smooth, restful surface of the mental pond.

Let your thoughts rise as they will, he heard his lama’s voice say clearly.

And he did, the morning slipping by as images, and with them, the sorting of his emotions and ideas.

When Christian had left the apartment earlier and walked the half block to Telegraph Avenue, the dawn dream had disappeared, hidden away with all the other nightmares. In the bright daylight of a fall morning, he was once again nineteen—lively, energetic, striding down the street at a brisk pace. With a half hour before reporting for his job at Cody’s Books, he had taken an outdoor table at the Forum across the street, ordered a cappuccino, and eavesdropped. The animated talk at the tables around him had been diverse: of classes and which professor was a good lecturer; about civil rights marches in the South and the growing escalation of troops in Vietnam; of a date for a concert of folk music on Friday night. One young woman with a guitar was passionately explaining how music was no longer simply about love but, thanks to poets like Bob Dylan, had a new message. Her friend laughingly told stories about the Sexual Freedom League, which had recently appeared on campus.

As Christian sat in lotus on the bedroom floor, letting his thoughts ebb and flow, he found himself remembering the conversations. He’d heard the concerned topics debated before, not only in coffeehouses, but also in bookstores, classrooms, student apartments, even on the streets as people met and exchanged greetings.

Something is happening here, in America, his mind whispered.

Born of the intolerance and injustice that had sparked the civil rights movement, of terrified children crouching under desks in fear of nuclear attack, an awareness was growing.

The people I know, Christian thought, they’re developing a new personal ethos. Not just one person, but hundreds. Thousands. A change in the course of their lives. The ideas almost shimmer in Berkeley’s very air.

Suddenly, the front door slammed hard.

Matt, Christian thought and could not help but grin and open his eyes, tromping in heavily enough that I can feel the vibration of his steps through the floorboards.

Christian! Come out here!

Matt stood in the center of the living room looking down into a large paper grocery bag, his dark, straight hair cut across his forehead in ragged bangs in an imitation of the Beatles.

Look at this! he cried, when Christian appeared. Is this wild? A kilo of grass!

Christian’s eyes passed over the bag and rested instead on the girl standing behind Matt. She was tall, thin, and different from other girls Matt had brought to the apartment. Instead of a short bob, her hair was long and golden blond and parted in the middle. She wore no dark eye makeup or pale lipstick, no fashionable sweater, miniskirt, or boots. She stood barefoot, her sandals neatly placed together at the door. Her nipples were two piercing dots beneath a plain cotton T-shirt, and her jeans inexpensive, bell-bottomed navy surplus.

Hi! I’m Lisa!

She laughed and turned to look quickly around the front room, then back into Christian’s eyes.

Christian stood captivated, lured by a question in her face, and suddenly, he was overwhelmed by her presence, a sense of meeting again, an old knowing with the suggestion of a new possibility between them. The sparkling eyes that regarded him were sunlight on the surface of a deep pool of emerald green. He found himself smiling into her open gaze and watched as she took in his appearance—tall, a few inches over six feet, blond, with light eyes the color of the clear autumn sky. Thoughts leapt between them, the magnetism so strong that he forced his hands into his jacket pockets to keep from reaching out to touch it.

Man! Look at this! Matt insisted, thrusting the bag in front of Christian’s face. She was just standin’ on the Ave and asked if I wanted to buy a lid. You know, like a whole ounce!

I just split up with Jacob, my old man, she giggled. The kilo’s my parting gift. Feel free to roll one up. Whatever I have is yours. I’m not into personal property.

I told Lisa she could live here, Matt said. She doesn’t have a place to stay. You don’t mind, do you?

Here? With you? Christian looked quickly toward Lisa to gauge the truth of it and saw that her eyes were filled with teasing mirth, waiting for his answer.

Yeah. I asked, and she said ‘yes.’

Praying his disappointment was not evident, he shrugged, Sure. And unable to help himself, he turned back to Lisa and added, If it’s what you both want.

That night, she taught them how to clean the kilo. Sixteen ounces to a pound, 2.2 pounds to a kilo. Stems and seeds—the throwaway—went onto old newspapers arranged on the floor. The leaves went into a separate pile to be weighed—ounces, half ounces, and quarter ounces—and then placed in plastic bags.

As they worked, they smoked, time different, listening to blues and jazz and folk songs on the small record player.

Can anyone tell me, Matt murmured, bits of dried leaf clinging to his hands as he worked, why we should get to hide in this university with a 2-S deferment because we can afford tuition while the poor are forced into the military? They’re sending more men to Vietnam every day.

Lisa turned to him. If you really want to do something about it, you need to join the Vietnam Day Committee. It’s Jerry Rubin’s new coalition of labor, students, and pacifists. They’re organizing draft-card burnings.

I can’t imagine what it might be like to live in that war every day, Christian nodded, slow and sensitive. I just heard of a new chemical weapon in my political science class. Napalm. It’s a jelly-like mixture that will explode and burn anything it touches at a temperature of 2000 degrees Fahrenheit.

Well, it’s all really simple, Lisa said pointedly. Have you heard the new slogan of the War Resisters League? ‘Wars will cease when men refuse to fight.’

In that headspace created by chemical sensitivity, Christian began to have an idea of the power of the plant. The space created by the smoke was visceral. In that inseparable intimacy with Lisa and Matt, he felt the war raging in Vietnam as something real, a knowledge known by his whole body, something apart from words or ideology—bombs, third-degree burns, the destruction of homes, fields, people—all real.

In the early morning hours, already listening to Matt’s soft snore where he’d fallen asleep on the floor, Lisa moved close enough that her knee touched his, the teasing feel of her running through his leg.

It’s not just the politics, Christian, she said softly. Knowing the history of Indochina and how the war began. The economic problems between Diem’s Catholic government and the majority Buddhist population. It’s war itself, whatever the cause. War is simply wrong. It only creates more problems, more misery, more thoughts of vengeance. We must break the cycle.

Yes, Christian nodded, resting his head back against the couch, knowing the truth of it, his eyes closing. And it’s up to us to find a solution.

That’s how it began, really. From that simple kilo of mediocre Mexican weed and easy sales to friends, a business developed, although at the time, they would never have thought of it as business—just new ideas, new friendships, new commitment, carried by the smoke and accompanied by plans to eradicate all the world’s evil.

In the weeks that followed, Christian watched with fascination as Lisa strolled down Telegraph Avenue, made a connection, and brought someone up to the apartment to buy a quarter or half ounce of grass. Although Lisa sold more than either he or Matt, she didn’t care about the money and took little from their group funds. Instead, she was more interested in searching for artists and activists to add to the mix of their friends and contacts. In late afternoon, she always sat in a circle on the living room floor with whoever was in the apartment, the swirl of smoke about her, listening to the music of Bob Dylan and Joan Baez, Phil Ochs and Pete Seeger, Sam Cooke and Buffy Sainte-Marie. And if Matt were elsewhere, she would lean close to Christian, her hair wrapped around her body, enticing, her glances filled with suggestion.

So it was that one afternoon in mid-November, pale sunlight streaming through the window, Lisa walked into the apartment to find Christian alone. She flopped onto the couch, lit a joint from her pocket, toked, and blew a perfect smoke ring at him, giggling.

When do you want to meet Jacob, Christian? We’re almost out of that kilo. We can go on over there if you want and get another one.

Surprised, he asked, Would you mind? Going over to Jacob’s. I mean … the two of you were once … He searched for a word.

Lovers? She grinned, teasing him. Jacob’s cool. I still visit. I just didn’t want to be his old lady any more. He’s too heavy into bucks. Grass is a gift from God. It belongs to all of us—to God who grows it, and to the people who learn from it. We’re just somewhere in the middle, passin’ it out.

Christian took a seat beside her on the couch, smiled into the soft stoned look in her eyes, and took the joint she held out to him. Toking, beginning to drift, he murmured softly, almost to himself, Everything you do is done with mindfulness, isn’t it? With intention. You understand karma, the cause and effect of actions.

Sitting up abruptly, her eyes widening, she asked, How do you know about karma? I thought I was the only one reading about Indian religion.

I was raised in India, he answered without thinking.

India?

He shrugged, uncomfortable. He hadn’t meant to tell her. My parents were missionaries. I’ve heard about karma all my life from the people in my village.

Christian! she cried. There are holy men in India! Men who know secrets that take you closer to God. One day I want to go to study with a Master. Do you ever think about going back?

Flashing on the life he had known, the teachers he had once called Guru, Christian turned away and tried shifting his gaze to a book on the coffee table. India belongs to my past, not to my future. So, what about Jacob?

Jacob? Now she laughed, India momentarily forgotten. Well, Jacob turned me on to pot and acid. And groovy ways of making love.

Acid?

You know. LSD. Someday I’ll turn you on. You think you’re ready? Ready to learn some new ways to make love? Still smiling, she reached out to touch his face. Acid’s one, giant erotic experience.

The small caress electrified him. He caught his breath and searched for words. Lisa, there’s something between us, but … Matt’s my best friend.

I’m my own person, Christian, she said softly, suddenly serious. I own my body.

I … we … And, unable to stop himself, the immediate longing to share his body with her a hard, overwhelming ache, he touched her face in return. We can’t do this to Matt. Not behind his back.

I don’t belong to him, she insisted, her voice low. When I came here, it was to get off the street. I’m nineteen years old and I know what I want. I want to be with you. We think the same.

Shaking his head slightly, he rose from the couch, trying to put some distance between them. But she stood with him, moved closer. Suddenly, her arms were around his neck, her breasts against his chest, lips touching his, her tongue gently searching.

Christian’s response was immediate, and he savored her lips, the soft feel of them, the shape of her mouth, losing himself in her scent, feeling his mind cover her, join with her, in this, his first real adult kiss. He knew little of girls. He was the only son of aging missionary parents, raised in early childhood in a small Indian village. Later, he’d attended a boys’ boarding school at a hill town of the old British Raj. All he had to rely on was one experience with a young woman, years ago, on holiday in Sri Lanka. Beyond that, Christian had not had the social experiences of Matt or Lisa, their uniquely Californian lives of teenage dances and dates, television shows and rock and roll, of experimentation.

Dear God, he murmured, pulling his fingers through her hair. I do want you. Only … it’s not right. Not like this.

His hand burned where it touched her throat and with unbelievable self-control, he refused to allow it to drift down her shirt.

It is right, she insisted gently, lifting his hand to her breast. What better time than right now?

Lust took away his breath and caught in his throat. He kissed her again, soft yielding lips open to him, the taste of smoke on her breath, but … he forced himself to stop. Took a step back. It’s not right.

Startled, Lisa eyed him. He read surprise. And something more. Uncertainty. A hint of anger.

Alright, she said slowly. Maybe we’d better chill out by going over to Jacob’s. His new shipment’s just in. If you want another kilo, you’d better go get it.

Lisa, he whispered hoarsely. Matt’s the only reason. Things would be different if you weren’t with him. If he were okay with … us. You understand?

Sure, Christian. I understand.

Sales grew.

Christian learned that Jacob had about twenty kilos, and they began turning a kilo’s worth of lids a week, rather than the quarter and half ounces they had been selling. Soon, Christian and Matt were making enough money to allow them to give up their part-time jobs. Then, at the beginning of December, a friend introduced them to Kevin, a dude who lived across the Bay in the Haight-Ashbury district of San Francisco.

Kevin was a bit older, maybe twenty-three or twenty-four. Although he was clean-shaven except for a full, dark mustache, they were startled to see that he’d grown his light brown hair out to his shoulders. About six feet tall, he wore a colorful shirt with a drawing on the back that people were beginning to recognize as a peace symbol, a figure adopted from the English nuclear disarmament sign of the fifties. Instead of a belt, a sash was tied around his waist, and in the cooler weather of November, he wore bright green socks with his sandals. Several strings of colorful beads hung from his neck, along with a curious bit of jewelry he called a roach clip. Kevin was, if anything, outrageous, and smiling a sleepy, stoned smile, he announced that he wanted a whole kilo. Kevin became their first sale outside the campus scene.

Greater turnovers meant there were more bucks. Before, when they’d had nothing, everything was shared. Now, Matt insisted they devise ways to split the profits so that each in the partnership knew what they had earned. Suddenly, money mattered to him. A business major, he used the fledging business as an experiment in economic theory. Matt kept the books and had numerous ideas about how to use combined funds to increase profits. Each time he took out his spreadsheets, Lisa raised an eyebrow at Christian.

In fact, the time Matt and Christian spent with others was so lucrative, their customers so insistent that they share a smoke, that they stopped attending classes. Wasn’t it far more educational—and profitable—to sit smoking together for the afternoon? After all, Matt explained, the whole point of a degree from a major university was to have options, a good job and career. What if it was possible to make more money by not attending school? And if moral and political principle were attached to the job, so much the better.

By December, both men were forced to resign from the university, knowing they could never pass finals.

When Matt and Christian returned from the registrar’s office in late afternoon, the natural light in the apartment had already begun to fade. The air they carried in from outside was cold.

So did you do it? Lisa asked.

Yeah. We’re done, Matt managed glumly, tossing his coat to the couch and throwing his body down beside it. We’re no longer students.

Lisa waved away his concern with a shake of her head and a shrug. Really, Matt. What does school have to teach anyway? Think about it.

Matt stared at her, hard, as if seeing her for the first time. When he finally spoke, his voice was thick with sarcasm. "Lisa, you’re a philosophy major dropout from Santa Cruz. What do you know about reality? Don’t you get it? Now that we’re out of school we’re eligible for the draft. We no longer have student deferments."

Come on, Matt, Christian told him, setting down his book bag. It’s not her fault we resigned. We’ll just re-enroll in January. In a few weeks.

Besides, Lisa tried, Jacob has a load of Acapulco Gold coming in for the holidays. You’re going to be too busy to study for finals.

At that, Matt exploded, his face darkening. I’m already putting together that deal with him! What the hell are you doing over at Jacob’s talking to him about that load?

I see Jacob all the time. You know that.

I don’t want you over there confusing things. Acting as if you speak for me. Just stay away from Jacob.

Lisa regarded him for several long seconds. When she finally spoke, her voice shook with the emotion of unaccustomed confrontation. You know, Matt, I’ve known Jacob a lot longer than you have. Don’t try telling me where I can or can’t go. I’ll make my own decisions.

I’m trying to develop a permanent business relationship! he answered hotly, his ire growing.

Lisa raised her chin, her posture hardening, everything about her suddenly accepting the challenge. I don’t know what’s going on with you, but it’s not my trip. I don’t get your mercenary attitude toward something that’s holy. Grass isn’t about money. If you can’t understand that, then we’re in a different headspace.

At her words, Matt jumped from the couch, his voice loud and threatening, moving closer. "You want to know something? I’m sick of your lectures on everything. The religious books you keep insisting I read. Every time I turn around, you’ve got new guys coming up here from the Ave to score. I’m beginning to wonder how you get them up here …"

Matt! Christian moved between them, his hand on Matt’s chest, his words uncertain, reflecting his surprise. Let’s … let’s slow down a bit … Glancing back over his shoulder, he saw that Lisa’s eyes sought his, held, and sent a silent message.

Stepping to the side to confront Matt directly, she made her intent clear. My path is more spiritual. And wherever that path is going to lead me, it’s not with you. I don’t want to be with you anymore, not ever again. It’s over.

Your path? Matt continued hoarsely, laughing in disbelief. Your ideas about how things should run would put us all back on the street hawking small amounts of pot on some corner. Like you were doing when I met you. So, go. Find your own space. See how well you do on your own.

Matt, Christian tried, watching as they faced each other, ease up, will you? The unfolding scene had become a lurid quagmire of emotion. Lisa lives here. She can come and go as she pleases.

Suddenly incredulous, outraged that Christian would take her side, Matt glared at him. Fuck you! he finally cried, turning his entire livid attention on Christian. Who the hell do you think you are? Like you think you’re better? Just because you come from India and thought about becoming a minister. Who is it you knew? Some Tibetan lama who taught you to meditate? But I know better. You’re just like all the rest of us dudes. Now, he cast a suspicious look at Lisa. He’s got lots of girlfriends. He just doesn’t bring them around.

Lowering his voice, Christian replied, Right now, meditation is exactly what we need. Let’s sit down, have a smoke, and talk.

Instead, looking as if he’d just realized something important that he’d missed, Matt demanded, Have you fucked my girlfriend?

Lisa flushed, her eyes bright and suddenly filled with tears, her gaze on Christian’s face. For a long moment, Christian wondered whether Matt really expected an answer.

You know I wouldn’t do that to you, he finally answered, his voice low.

But you’ve both thought about it. Haven’t you?

Matt … Christian sighed.

Not now. I’m not up for another lesson in logic.

With a last frustrated scowl, he left the apartment, slamming the door hard.

When the reverberation of sound fell away, Christian took Lisa into his arms, stroking her hair, unnerved by her quiet weeping. It’s all right. Don’t cry. I’m sorry. He’s … he’s just not himself. Please don’t cry. Look, what do you want to do?

You know the only reason I’ve been sticking around is to be near you, she whispered. Is it true? Do you have lots of girlfriends?

No. His lips moved over her tear-brimmed eyes, whispering, Matt’s just … a little tense. The draft. Maybe a bit of paranoia. We’ve been carrying bags of grass through the streets. Sometimes you just don’t know who might be watching …

Oh, Christian, she breathed softly, her lips touching his.

Lisa! he cried with real frustration. What would I say to him?

Just tell him I’m moving into your room.

"He already feels I’ve betrayed him. What would he say to your moving in? He …

Reviews for A Nation of Mystics/ Book One

[Selina Cooper · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I really enjoyed this book! Brings back my own memories of the late 60’s, although I was just slightly too young to really be a part of it. I thought the author had an interesting perspective on the whole drug culture scene, and I really loved all the social connections that were made and developed throughout the “Summer of Love” in the Haight Ashbury. Somehow, it made me feel very nostalgic, even though I did not actually live there at that time. I myself came to SF in the late 70’s when there was actually still quite a bit of remnants remaining of that earlier time in the Haight. Of course, at this point, almost 50 years later (?!) everything is very different.

I was never into the psychedelic drug scene, but it was interesting to read the vivid descriptions of how these drugs affect the mind. Also, how much opportunity there was for very ordinary (but bright) young men and women to become first small time dealers and then go on to make great fortunes selling these drugs.

The one criticism I have is that the author paints such a positive picture of all this, and what a wonderful drug LSD is for mind expansion, and spiritual awakening when, in fact, it was not quite like that at all. LSD and it’s popularity and wide spread use among the young people of that time, unfortunately, left many deaths and severely mentally impaired people in it’s wake. I was kind of disappointed that the author did not include a more realistic, wholistic description of both sides to this situation. Perhaps she does in her next two books, which I really want to read as well. I became really involved with the characters and want to follow them as they continue on in there journey to see what happens!

One last thing to mention is that, at the same time I was reading this book, I also listened to the audiobook of PDK’s A SCANNER DARKLY, which deals with similar subject matter of drug mania, but in a much more deeply disturbing manner. I don’t know if I can say his book really “tells it like it is”, but it definitely shows us the flip side of wonderful. It was a good contrast to read/listen to both simultaneously.